Why Diets Fail

WORDS: PHOTOGRAPHY

Many are used to living with exhaustion, pain, extra weight and feeling stressed; not in sync with their bodies. This is ludicrous stuff. Our health is the most important thing we have in life. Forget expensive cars, how many Instagram followers you have, or what handbag you carry. This is important, how we approach our health is important, and it should be a non-negotiable.

Eating and mobility is something that should come naturally to us in order to live, but how do we get it all wrong? Being bombarded with so much information swirling around, it’s hard to know what the heck to do. Dieting has a lot of failings, but many turn to this tempting and drastic behaviour to lose weight. Unfortunately, this is not sustainable or focussed on longer-term health implications.

 

Even if you do know what is best for your body, it can still be a struggle to live by these principles. This is where centering and being mindful comes into play. Each habit we have (and I’m talking good and bad ones) is the direct result of small daily decisions that happen over time.

To improve habits, we need to challenge these decisions to form the person we want to be. The way you are currently living is a direct result of the sum of your habits. Doesn’t that just blow your mind?

 

What do you do if you want to improve your relationship? You think about everything you say and do.

What do you do if you want to increase your income? You continually strategies ways to earn more money.

What do you do if you want to improve your energy levels and vitality? You focus on the small daily habits that have brought you to where you currently are.

 

Lack of energy, uneven skin tone, sleep, stress and digestion issues are often a symptom of many problems. The disassociation between our minds and bodies is something we tend to overlook when it comes to finding our ideal weight, but this is a critical factor!

To move towards making a change, we must first create awareness around the situation. 

For example, let’s say winter has been very kind to you and a few kilos have crept back on. In hope of losing this weight, a boot camp binge or spring juice cleanse sounds tempting.  These methods are merely cover-ups for deeper conversations with ourselves and lead to non-sustainable results.

By focussing on your behaviours with simple strategies, it will become easier to maintain a healthy weight.

 

An inexpensive and effective tool for this is a food diary. As simple as it sounds, committing to a food diary for at least a week uncovers patterns and where your true demons lie. Go one step further with this and take notes on what you are feeling at the time you ate, who you were with, what else was going on. Seeing your food intake on paper is a great self-monitoring tool plus awareness of your body’s cues will help future decisions around your food choices.

 

Can you picture a vibrant rainbow with your daily food choices, or is it white (refined grains) and gloomy (coffee)? Are you planning your weekly meals or flying by the seat of your pants? Perhaps you’re not present with what you’re consuming and focusing on your iphone and ignoring your bodies signal. Did you know that 30-40% satiety comes from registering the meal in our minds?

Perhaps you might be using food as a source of comfort, where alternate strategies to focus on undoing habits could be your answer.

 

Ask yourself what is stopping you from consistently moving your body and committing to a fitness plan? Willpower isn’t something you want to be relying on each day, which is why it’s important to create something that you actually like doing.

Lack of time is another common excuse but look at it this way: you’re devoting less than 2-3% of your day to exercise (30mins), and it might be this 3% that shifts your mindset to a more positive direction for the remaining 97% of your day.

 

Your relationship with yourself and your habits is one of the most intimate and important relationships in your life. Our brains are excuse making machines, and although life is one big experiment, it’s time to understand and trust each other.

 

For more great tips from Karla go to her web site

 www.karlagilbert.com.au and facebook @ironmumkarla